Pokerface
by demondreaming
Summary: Cat's like Jade's sidekick, but Jade's no hero. Cat can see behind Jade's mask, can see past her pokerface. Rated T for... stuff, and light femmeslashing. Cat/Jade pairing.


**Disclaimer: Cat and Jade are not mine. Not yet _**

You're like her sidekick. No. Not her sidekick, not exactly. Sure you're small, and you jump at her every command. Wait, do sidekicks _have _to be smaller than the heroes? Or is it 'cause sidekicks are younger, so they're sort of naturally- anyway, Jade's not a hero, she's more of a villain, and you don't think villains have sidekicks. Lackeys, yes, and henchmen, but you're neither, and you feel like you're a hero when you're with her. You're more like a puppy, always trailing after her, your tail wagging when she so much as looks at you. You're like a puppy in the way that she can hit you, abuse you with her words, and you'll still come running back, because deep down, she loves you. You think. You hope. Sometimes you're not sure. Okay, most of the time you're not sure. You think Jade's a _really_ good actress, the way she hides everything she's feeling. An actress or a poker player, but you never really understood poker, so you can't say whether it's an apt comparison or not. You just know you like that song by Lady Gaga, which you didn't really understand either, but who says you have to understand something to like it? You think maybe Jade doesn't have feelings, because you can't understand why she wouldn't show them. But you know she does, they're just hidden behind her eyes, and you have to watch them really carefully, but you can see them. Like a plane flying overhead at night, the _blink blink blink _of the lights the only sign that it's there. But it is there. You can sense the shape of it, but even if you squint, you can't tell exactly what it is.

People say you should act with your eyes. You can't remember which people, or whether it was in a book, or on TV, or something you came up with yourself, but it's true. You try acting with your eyes, but you just end up using your eyebrows more than anything, and then you get distracted with wiggling them. That's why you think Jade's such a good actress. You can't tell from her face, but you can see it in her eyes, and it's so much more real than saying, 'I'm angry, grrr!' and sometimes you lose yourself watching the emotions play out, and it's like a storm at sea, and you're a little boat (a catamaran, of course) being tossed about in the waves. And you can't help but compare her to the night, everything at night, and it's not because of the way she dresses, or the way she acts, it's her... the deceptive simplicity. At first you think it's dark, just black of night and white of moon, but you start to see the shades of grey as your eyes adjust, start to see the vague shapes of things around you. Things that look vaguely familiar, but are made scary by the gloom.

You like her. You don't know why, because she's only ever mean to you, and she never apologises. You actually think that's why you like her, that she's so unapologetic, that she's so confident in who and what she is. She's the polar opposite of you, and you seek that out, like it's some vital part of your diet that you're missing, that's essential to your health. You know she finds you annoying, finds your childish optimism insufferable. You think she likes you though, or, if not likes, tolerates. She doesn't seem to mind having you around, even buys you candy sometimes, although she says it's just to shut you up. She's never said she likes you, but you think she does. It's hard to tell. But she's been hanging out with you more, as she slowly drifts away from Beck, and sometimes you can make her smile, and once, even laugh. You feel useful then, that you're not a dead weight to her. That you're her friend, and not her stalker.

Jade makes you feel funny Cat-feelings inside. Like when you drink something sweet, and you can taste it all the way down, and you can tell it's sweet just from the way it sits in your stomach, because it just feels sugary and airy. You think you have a crush on her. Except crush sounds painful, and this doesn't hurt, it feels nice, like a warm glow inside. You have a glow on her. It would explain a lot. You're not sure though. You don't feel about anyone else like this, but that just means you have nothing to compare it to. You thought about asking Tori, but you know she doesn't like to talk about Jade. Nobody really likes talking about Jade.

She invites you to her house one afternoon, driving you there in her car while you fiddle with her radio and she put up with it. You've been thinking about it, and you're pretty sure you're her only friend. Besides Beck, but he's a different kind of friend. You wonder why she invites you over, since she always seems to get sick of you, and sometimes she makes you walk home. But not often.

You sit in the sinking sunlight that pours through her window, your back facing it and glowing warm. If you sit just right, it's like the sunlight is a liquid, cascading over you, and you can see it make a halo in your hair, make the fine hairs on your arm glow golden with light, like they're on fire. You frown, blowing on your arm to make sure. You know they're not on fire, but it doesn't hurt to check. You figure you look less stupid blowing on your arm than nursing your singed arm hairs. You jump as a hand brushes your hair lightly, stroking the highlighted locks. It's Jade, it's her hand that's trailing through your ruby-hued hair, and it feels nice, and it makes you feel warmer than the sunshine did, and in a different place. On the inside.

"Your hair looks really good in this light. Like it's on fire." Jade says, a smile in her voice and a trace of it on her lips. The way she says it is almost like an insult, but you know she means it as a compliment. You think that if she said it like a compliment, it wouldn't mean as much, because you would know it wasn't sincere. That she didn't mean it, because nice is not her.

You gush thank you, and your hand moves impulsively to her arm, tracing over the star tattoo that's there. You've always liked it, and it always made sense to you, because Jade is a star. You expect the skin to feel different where her tattoo is, but it doesn't really, it's just skin, so you touch it extra to make sure, running your fingers around it and tracing the shape with your nails. Jade turns her arm more toward you, giving you better access, and you take the opportunity to study it. If she put it on her skin forever that means it's important to her, so you should pay attention to it, engrave it in your head. "You know that the stars we see in the sky could be dead? The light takes hundreds of thousands of years to get here, so by the time we see them, they could have died already, and we wouldn't know." You look up at Jade as you say this, because you think it's really interesting, and you thought she'd like to hear it. You feel like it's important. Jade has a little smile on her lips, and although she never smiles, it feels natural to see her with this kind of smile.

"It's like us." She says quietly, and your fingers still over her tattoo, covering it. You tilt your head in confusion, and her smile grows a little bigger. "Actors." She elaborates, "You can see us after we're long dead, in movies and stuff, and we never age. I like to think that's why we're called stars. Because we're here forever, at our best, even after we die. People can see us even after we're gone."

Your eyes are wide, because Jade never opens up to you, and you feel funny that she is, that she's looking at you like you're not stupid, and you realise that she's been doing that for a while. Like she thinks you have something worth listening to inside you. People don't look at you like that. People look at you like they don't understand, like what you say isn't relevant, but it's just a different kind of relevant, and Jade's looking at you like she understands that. You feel that heat inside you grow unbearable, and you start to think that the sun really has set you on fire, just on the inside, because you can feel it spreading, climbing up your torso and making your chest feel tight.

You're leaning over before you can stop yourself, and you're not thinking, you know you're not, because you don't know what you're doing. Your body's moving on it's own, acting on it's own impulses, and you're trying to figure out what it wants when you kiss her. Kiss Jade. Right on the lips. Part of your mind is relieved, now that it knows what your body wants, but the biggest part of your mind is just frozen, just overwhelmed, but you're still conscious enough to note a few things. Like the fact that Jade's lips are soft and warm, and they feel really good against yours. You've never really kissed anyone before, not for real, it's all been stage kisses that meant nothing. But this feels nice. Really nice. It feels real.

Jade pushes you away gently, your lips parting with a soft sound. She gives you a curious look, and you don't know why. She should know why you kissed her. People only kiss each other for one reason, right? You kissed her because you wanted to kiss her, so... you kissed her. "Cat," Jade says slowly, still holding your shoulders. "What was that?"

She doesn't look angry, and you're relieved by that, because you couldn't take anger. Not from her. But the way she asks you... her words slow and careful... it makes you feel stupid again. She's talking to you like you don't understand, like you don't know what you did. Like you're a child.

"I kissed you." You say simply, and a flicker of frustration crosses her face. It's not you who doesn't understand, it's her. She thinks you don't get it. But you do. You know what this means, and you can't help that it seems simple to you.

"I know Cat. I was there." She says dryly, and her eyebrows are dark and heavy, like stormclouds over the sea of her eyes. You can't help but notice the disparity between her tone and her actions, because she's rubbing your shoulders with her thumbs, and there's no need for her to even be touching you at all. But she is, tentatively and gently, and you wish she was more in tune with her body, wish she'd listen to it instead of thinking too much, listening too much to her head. "Cat..." She bites her lip, and you can finally see the conflict emerge from behind that sardonic mask she wears. "You can't just do that. You can't just kiss people without thinking."

You thought she understood you, but she doesn't understand enough. You don't understand you sometimes, so it's too much to expect her to... no, it's not too much. It's not enough. You might do impulsive things, you might not think too much about the results, but you always deal with the consequences. You're not a child. You can take responsibility, and you're much more responsible than she knows. "I know." And you're saying it slowly to her, because for once, she's the one that doesn't understand, she's the one who's not dealing with the consequence. She's the one who's pushing you away by treating you like a child. You think she's starting to get it, starting to realise that you're serious, that you know what you did and why. You can see it scares her a little, and you've never seen Jade scared before. You wish she wasn't scared, and you wish you weren't the cause of that.

"Cat..." The tone of her voice is soft, and it's like Jade without her shell, without the edge that's always present in her voice. You don't look up. You don't want to see the pity in her eyes, you don't want to ruin how you see her eyes, but her fingertips brush your cheek gently, making you look at her. She swallows thickly, her eyes flicking over you, scanning your face, and for some reason it doesn't make you feel self-conscious, because you know she's looking for something, something even she doesn't fully realise. "I... I'm not..." Her voice is unsteady, quiet, as if she's telling you a secret. And she's telling you much more than she thinks simply by not finishing her sentence, her lie. You may not be book smart, or street smart or any type of smart in particular, but you're intuitive. You know people, even when sometimes you wish you didn't. You can't be in touch with your emotions that much and not recognise them in other people. They just hide them a little better. You know what Jade is trying to say... what she can't say, and you lean forward again, bringing your lips to hers and stopping her uneasy words. Her lies. You know what she's feeling, even if she can't admit to herself. You know, because you're feeling it too. The difference is; you're not afraid. Her lips are still against yours at first, and she makes a half-hearted attempt to pull away, to stop it before it begins, but you cup her face, keeping it still and feeling her lips tremble against you. You can feel your heart pounding, beating so hard you're sure she can feel it pulsing from your lips, and maybe she can, because she starts to kiss you back.

You don't have to lie. That's one thing you like about yourself; that you never have to lie about what you're feeling. You don't have to deny how much you're enjoying Jade's lips moving against yours, don't have to question your sexuality because of that. You know that she is... that she _will _question herself, and it's one of those things that mean more because it's her doing it, It's her kissing you. It's one of the things she does that mean more than if anyone else did them. Like her veiled compliments, the way she's not touchy-feely, but it means that much more when she does touch you. You know Jade likes clarity, simplicity, and the fact that she's kissing you...

She's letting you complicate her.

**A/N: Here's the place where I beg you to review. But I'm gonna be a bit more classy than that and play it cool.**

**So yeah, review... or don't. Whatever.**

**Hah, just kidding. I'm not classy. Please for to review. 0-0**

**Tell what me what you liked. I do so love to hear it. And it makes my fingers itch (itch to write that is, not itch like some form of skin disease.**

…**.**

**Okay, maybe both.)**

**You do want more fics, right? That's right, I'm not above blackmail. Well... I am, but not above lying obviously.**


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